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President Dmitry Medvedev has given assurances that there was no radiation leak and that the vessel's nuclear-tipped missiles were not on board. He has summoned top Cabinet officials to report on the situation and demanded punishment for anyone found responsible.

Military prosecutors have launched an investigation into whether safety regulations were breached.

The fire, which broke out yesterday and shot orange flames high into the air throughout the night, was put out this afternoon.

Firefighters continued to spray the vessel with water to cool it down, Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu said.

Russian state television earlier
showed the rubber-coated hull of the submarine still smouldering, with
firemen gathering around it and some standing on top to douse it with
water.

A Defence Ministry spokesman insisted there was never any danger of the fire spreading inside

Emergency: Seven crew members who inhaled carbon monoxide fumes were evacuated to hospital

Most modern submarines' outer hulls are covered with rubber to make them less noisy and more difficult for an enemy to detect.

Norway's Radiation Protection Authority across the border reported it has not measured any increased radioactivity.

The governor in Finnmark, Norway's
north-eastern province that borders Russia, and the radiation agency
complained about the Russian response.

Gunnar Kjoennoey said: 'There have
been problems to get clear information from the Russian side. We have an
agreement to exchange information in such cases, but there has been no
information from the Russian side so far.'

Russia's military said the blaze
started on wooden scaffolding and then engulfed the sub's outer hull.
The vessel's nuclear reactor had been shut down and its nuclear-tipped
missiles and other weapons had been unloaded before dry-dock repairs, it
said.

President Dmitry Medvedev gave assurances that there was no radiation leak and that the vessel's nuclear-tipped missiles were not on board

Thick smoke rises from the dock where the Yekaterinburg was being repaired

Toxic fumes from the blaze had spread
to the town of Roslyakovo where the shipyard is located, but officials
said there was no need to evacuate local residents.

RUSSIAN SUBMARINE DISASTERS

The huge fire which engulfed the
Yekaterinburg nuclear submarine is the latest catastrophe to afflict
Russian submarines in recent years.

In November 2008 20 Russians choked to death on poisonous gas on board the Nerpa nuclear submarine.

The
men suffocated when faulty firefighting equipment went off by mistake
while the new craft was carrying out underwater tests in the Sea of
Japan.

In August 2003, two member of a 10-man crew on a Russian K-159 sub died when the vessel sank in the Barents Sea.

The
submarine's nuclear reactor was shut down at the time the vessel sank
about three nautical miles north west of Kildin Island.

But by far the worst Russian sub disaster in recent memory happened on the Kursk (pictured above) in August 2000.

An explosion during exercises sent the nuclear sub to the bottom of the Barents Sea, killing all 118 men on board.

Russia refused offers of help from Britain and the United States and a Russian rescue attempt failed.

The former director of the biggest
shipyard in the area said the fire was probably caused by the failure to
take proper safety precautions, such as coating the scaffolding with
special sprays to make it fire-resistant.

Nikolai Kalistratov said: 'It was either lack of professionalism or an attempt to save money that has turned into huge losses.'

The Yekaterinburg is a Delta IV-class
nuclear-powered submarine that normally carries 16 nuclear-tipped
intercontinental ballistic missiles. The 548ft-long vessel has a
displacement of 18,200 tons when submerged.

The chief of the General Staff of the
Russian armed forces, General Nikolai Makarov, led a team of senior
military officials to Roslyakovo to oversee the emergency response.

The damage from the fire could be so
massive that the submarine would need to be scrapped. But Deputy Prime
Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who is in charge of the nation's military
industries, today said that the submarine will rejoin the navy after
repairs.

The Russian navy suffered its worst
accident in August 2000, when the Kursk nuclear submarine exploded and
sank during naval maneuvers, killing all 118 crew members aboard.

A 2008 accident at the Nerpa
nuclear-powered submarine killed 20 Russian seamen and injured 21 others
when its fire-extinguishing system activated in error and spewed
suffocating Freon gas.

Before the blaze: Russia's nuclear-powered submarine Yekaterinburg pictured last year

At the helm: A Russian sailor sits in the control room of the Yekaterinburg submarine at an earlier date